Is 2019 will be the fifth hottest year?

Overall, 2018 was the fourth-warmest year on record, and climate change trends suggest that temperatures will only continue to climb, scientists said February 6 during a joint news conference by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA. 2019 is already expected to be the 5^th hottest year on record. Whatever place 2019 gets, the five year period of 2014 to 2019 is expected to be the warmest five year period on record, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) reported. This finding is based on five independently maintained global temperature data sets, the agency said. 

The scientific evidence supporting human-caused global warming is overwhelming. Climate change is also leading to more erratic rainfall across much of the world. A warmer atmosphere holds more water vapor, which can both prolong droughts and lead eventually to bigger downpours once the water is released. In addition to high temperatures, 2019 also had its fair proportion of catastrophic events, along with hurricanes, floods, warmth waves and droughts, the WMO suggested. Climate change could make weather events more extreme than they would be in any other case.  

Moreover, long-term indicators show that human-caused climate change isn’t going away, as carbon dioxide concentrations continue to increase, sea levels are rising and ocean acidification is getting worse. We have witnessed extraordinary weather, consisting of temperatures topping 50 degrees Celsius [122 degrees F] in Asia, record-breaking hurricanes in fast succession in the Caribbean and Atlantic reaching as a long way as Ireland, devastating monsoon flooding affecting many hundreds of thousands of humans and a relentless drought in East Africa.

“Every fraction of a degree of warming makes a difference to human health and access to food and fresh water, to the extinction of animals and plants, to the survival of coral reefs and marine life” said WMO Deputy Secretary-General Elena Manaenkova.  “It makes a difference to economic productivity, food security, and to the resilience of our infrastructure and cities. It makes a difference to the speed of glacier melt and water supplies, and the future of low-lying islands and coastal communities. Every extra bit matters.”

So these facts are alarming but no unexpected!!

Written by: Ali Sarmad Kazmi